College basketball: UCLA survives with overtime win over UC Irvine

LOS ANGELES - Tuesday night's UCLA basketball game against UC Irvine was officially billed as the opening game of the Legends Classic's Los Angeles Regional.

Regardless of the result, the Bruins knew their ticket to Brooklyn for the championship rounds at Barclays Center next week would be punched.

UCLA looked to already have one foot on the plane in an ugly 80-79 overtime win. If not for some timely free throws and redshirt senior Larry Drew II's driving layup with 17 seconds remaining, UCLA would have been bound for the East Coast to face three other storied programs with a thick, black smudge on its early season resume.

Recently reopened Pauley Pavilion - UCLA's $136-million construction project - lacked the energy it had last Friday in its inaugural game, a 27-point victory against Indiana State. The energy wasn't there on the floor, either.

Coach Ben Howland promised to run the floor more with a deeper lineup than he had a year ago, yet the Anteaters beat the Bruins at their own game. UCLA didn't help its own cause by turning over the ball nine times. UCLA failed to get out of its traditional half-court sets for the majority of the game.

UC Irvine, of the Big West Conference, looked every bit as capable as the Pacific-12 Conference's mighty No. 13 Bruins, who were picked to finish second to Arizona in the preseason media poll.

If redshirt junior twin forwards Travis and David Wear had not willed the Bruins to an early advantage, the Anteaters might have won. The Wear twins, now in their third year in UCLA's system after transferring from North Carolina, helped the Bruins jump out of the gate by combining to score 14 of the Bruins' first 21 points to open up a 12-point lead.

From there, the Anteaters went on a 7-0 run to narrow the gap and remain within striking distance for the remainder of the game.

Senior forward Michael Wilder, who finished with 23 points, scored 10 straight points down the stretch, including a 3-pointer that gave the Anteaters a one-point lead with 2:49 to play.

After Bruin freshman Jordan Adams knocked down two free throws, UC Irvine's Alex Young was left all alone for a corner 3-pointer. Redshirt junior forward David Wear badly missed a long two-pointer that would have tied the score with 45 seconds remaining. After Adams made two more free throws, UC Irvine sophomore forward Will Davis kept the Bruins' hopes alive by missing two free throws with two seconds left, either of which would have won the game.

The overtime period belonged to Adams, who led UCLA in scoring with 26, the most points scored by a Bruins freshman since Kevin Love scored 29 in an NCAA Tournament game against Western Kentucky in 2009. Adams was 8-for-8 from the free-throw line in the final eight minutes.

UCLA will continue Legends Classic play in the Los Angeles Regional on Thursday, when it hosts James Madison at Pauley Pavilion.